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False Teaching and Post-Modernity
It's pretty conceptual, this is an excellent thought about the greatest source of false teaching that has infiltrated the church in our day: the seeming avoidance of the fact that Christianity is true for the idea that it is "good" or "it works". This is a dangerous road:
"Peter's warnings about false teachers are, unfortunately, as appropriate today as they were in his time. Indeed, as we have seen, our Lord has warned us to expect such deviations from the faith. The church will always have to contend with both the outright opposition of those who reject Christ entirely as well as the more subtle threats of those who claim the name of Christian but twist and distort the Christian message. Indeed, precisely because they are more subtle, the latter threat is often the more dangerous one.
We can argue that the danger of false teaching is greater in our day than it has ever been. Why? Because we live in an era that is deeply suspicious of absolute truth. It used to be that people would argue about what religion, philosophy, or system of ethics was “right.” English literature classes in college debated about the “correct” interpretation of Charles Dickens’s Our Mutual Friend. However, college classes today discuss differing perspectives—often mutually contradictory—that one might validly see in Dickens’s great novel. The idea of “a correct interpretation” is dismissed at the outset. And when people discuss religion these days, they usually content themselves with a claim such as, “It works for me,” or, “It’s not for everybody, but it’s my road to spiritual fulfillment.”
Our society has embraced pluralism and tolerance as its new gods. Observers of society and its intellectual movements have dubbed this new viewpoint “postmodernism,” signaling the shift from the typically modernist pursuit for truth to the current preoccupation with “whatever works for you.” Basic to this new way of approaching reality is an “incredulity towards metanarratives.” “Translated, this means: distrust any voice that purports to tell you that ‘that’s the way it is.’ ”9 We live at a time when everything is tolerated—except intolerance. In such a climate of opinion, Christians often find it both uncomfortable and difficult to take a stand for absolute truth. “What right do you have to impose your morality, or your religion, on me?” people will ask when we take a stand for the faith.
As a result, many Christians have conceded the debate over truth and increasingly rely on a defense of the faith more congenial to our age: that of utilitarianism. “Our witness today is witness to our own faith, and in affirming its validity we may become less interested in its truthfulness than in the fact that it seems to work.” It is not hard to imagine the disastrous consequences of this move for the Christian faith. For the Scriptures claim Jesus Christ is “the way” to the Father, not one among many others. Absolute truth is built into the warp and woof of Christianity." [1]
False Teaching and Post-Modernity
It's pretty conceptual, this is an excellent thought about the greatest source of false teaching that has infiltrated the church in our day: the seeming avoidance of the fact that Christianity is true for the idea that it is "good" or "it works". This is a dangerous road:
"Peter's warnings about false teachers are, unfortunately, as appropriate today as they were in his time. Indeed, as we have seen, our Lord has warned us to expect such deviations from the faith. The church will always have to contend with both the outright opposition of those who reject Christ entirely as well as the more subtle threats of those who claim the name of Christian but twist and distort the Christian message. Indeed, precisely because they are more subtle, the latter threat is often the more dangerous one.
We can argue that the danger of false teaching is greater in our day than it has ever been. Why? Because we live in an era that is deeply suspicious of absolute truth. It used to be that people would argue about what religion, philosophy, or system of ethics was “right.” English literature classes in college debated about the “correct” interpretation of Charles Dickens’s Our Mutual Friend. However, college classes today discuss differing perspectives—often mutually contradictory—that one might validly see in Dickens’s great novel. The idea of “a correct interpretation” is dismissed at the outset. And when people discuss religion these days, they usually content themselves with a claim such as, “It works for me,” or, “It’s not for everybody, but it’s my road to spiritual fulfillment.”
Our society has embraced pluralism and tolerance as its new gods. Observers of society and its intellectual movements have dubbed this new viewpoint “postmodernism,” signaling the shift from the typically modernist pursuit for truth to the current preoccupation with “whatever works for you.” Basic to this new way of approaching reality is an “incredulity towards metanarratives.” “Translated, this means: distrust any voice that purports to tell you that ‘that’s the way it is.’ ”9 We live at a time when everything is tolerated—except intolerance. In such a climate of opinion, Christians often find it both uncomfortable and difficult to take a stand for absolute truth. “What right do you have to impose your morality, or your religion, on me?” people will ask when we take a stand for the faith.
As a result, many Christians have conceded the debate over truth and increasingly rely on a defense of the faith more congenial to our age: that of utilitarianism. “Our witness today is witness to our own faith, and in affirming its validity we may become less interested in its truthfulness than in the fact that it seems to work.” It is not hard to imagine the disastrous consequences of this move for the Christian faith. For the Scriptures claim Jesus Christ is “the way” to the Father, not one among many others. Absolute truth is built into the warp and woof of Christianity." [1]
[1] Douglas J. Moo, 2 Peter, Jude, The NIV Application Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1996), 97-99.
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